BUTTERFLIES FLUTTERED AS CHAMBER MUSIC SOARED
By David Bratman
March 25, 2025
Before intermission came the Piano Concerto by Grażyna Bacewicz, the mid-20th-century Polish composer whose works have been emerging lately in performance. This 1949 piece has recently been unearthed thanks in part to the efforts of Saturday’s soloist, David Fung.
You could easily mistake the music for a lost Sergei Prokofiev concerto, particularly in Fung’s propulsive rendition. The solo part is full of characteristic Prokofiev-like figures: simple chordal melodies, crisp runs followed by sudden pounding on the keyboard, brief high-tension climaxes — all executed with precision and vigor here.
The accompaniment is similar while exhibiting Bacewicz’s distinctive approach to orchestration. The composer balances ensemble and soloist nicely, never letting the music get too clotted or grandiose. Under Cabrera, the orchestra had its finest moments at the beginning of the slow movement, where darkly shimmering strings combine with ominous sounds from the winds, and in the finale, which features a prominent role for percussion.
Fung reinforced his firm, snappy approach in his encores, playing Franz Schubert’s gentle Moment Musical No. 3 with a jumpy percussive attack and following this with Moritz Moszkowski’s busy and lively showpiece “Étincelles” (as popularized by Vladimir Horowitz).